No.
It was more than that. She had changed.
She had been a servant.
He heard footsteps coming from the opposite direction around the bend. Elias heard them, too, and stayed close to his father, which filled Nicholas’ heart with love for him.
“Ah, Rothbury,” said Barnabas Black, Viscount of Bellington. “I was not sure we would see you here. I did not believe you had finally returned.”
The viscount was a tall, average built, uninteresting man with long dark hair reaching to his shoulders and even darker eyes. Nicholas wasn’t sure what it was but he remembered that he didn’t like him. He didn’t trust him.
Nicholas tried to force his smile but it seemed more difficult than it ever had before. He’d forgotten how to fake his interest in people like the viscount. “Bellington, had I known you would be here, I would have stayed away.”
Bellington tossed back his head and laughed, having no idea that Nicholas was serious. Men like Bellington didn’t know him. Not the real him.
“You must tell me who this is,” Bellington drawled and closed in on Julianna like a predator that had just spotted its prey while she bent to gather up his son.
Nicholas stepped into his way, putting his body between them. “She is Miss Feathers, my son’s governess and…my betrothed.”
She tilted her face and looked up at him with a playful smile.
Saying it felt unreal, fantastical. It was something he had only dreamed about in the past. He smiled back at her. “We are to be married in the spring.”
“Ah, your betrothed.” Bellington grinned and gave Nicholas a hearty pat on the back. “Now your long absence makes sense!”
Nicholas’ smile froze and his eyes watered for an instant while she gave his arm a painful pinch.
Without the slightest flinch, he turned to introduce her friends, using the names she’d given him a few moments earlier. Bellington set his hungry gaze on Agnes next.
Nicholas stepped closer to the viscount yet again and leaned down to warn him in his ear. “She is my commander’s woman. He approaches as we speak. He is unreasonable and unruly. I would use caution were I you.”
Nicholas’ smile remained as he gave Bellington’s back a hard pat of his own.
Rather than stay and meet the commander, the viscount promised to meet and talk again later.
“Arrogant bastard,” Nicholas muttered as they parted ways and he and his party moved on toward the great hall. “He has not changed in two years.”
“Why should he change?” Julianna asked him.
Aye, she was correct. The viscount had no reason to change. Nicholas was expecting too much. He agreed to sit through this to show his support for peace between Scotland and England, not to give a damn how rotten the statesmen were.
He led them to his raised table. “Do not fear,” he promised them as Rauf caught up—and smiled a bit more meaningfully when he looked at Agnes. “This is a small gathering of the bishop’s closest allies. Only a few other noblemen are here.”
“I’m not afraid,” Julianna reassured him. “I carry my knife.”
Nicholas smiled but his eyes opened wide on her. “Woman, the bishop prohibits weapons in his presence.”
She gave a slight shrug. “He will not find out unless he tries to touch what he should not.”
He laughed softly and leaned back to have a better look at her from head to toe while she sat Elias in the chair. “Where do you hide it, lass?”
She cut him a smile filled with promise and whimsy. “We would have to be married for you to find out.”
His playful smile remained. “Did you not hear me tell Bellington we were to be married in the spring?”
She reached out to pinch him again but he moved back, avoiding her hand. “Nicholas, marriage is nothing to jest about.”
He waited for her and the other women to sit then he took his place at the center, with Julianna and his son on his left and the seat at his right, where Rauf usually sat, empty. His commander sat in the seat beside it, with Agnes after him.
